Trick or Treat

Smell my feet!

Give me something good to eat!

Give me candy. Give me cake.

Give me something good to take.

Hey! It worked!
Happy Halloween!

Two Tickets to Paradise

I've got two tickets to paradise, 

Won't you pack your bags, we'll leave tonight…

Haven’t you heard stories, on the news or maybe even read about people who just disappear? Someone might go to work then never come home. Or maybe it’s time to go to the store or school and that’s the last time you’re seen. Some, I know, fall victim to mean people who kidnap or kill then hide the bodies. Some are in bad situations and have help to vanish so they can live. Some are just people who don’t want to be where, or who, they are anymore.

Surely it’s crossed your mind. What if you just kept driving? What if instead of getting on the plane and coming back to reality you decide just to stay wherever you are and start another life? What if? What if?

I’ll admit it’s crossed my mind. I wouldn’t mind just being somewhere else. Maybe just for a day or even a week. Or maybe just being someone else. Sometimes I just want to go where there are no worries and no cares. Paradise.

 

Out of curiosity I did a search on the Internet. There are actually instructions on how to just fade away, vanish, without a trace. No records, no identification, no history. Is that how people do it? What would it feel like to have no history? No background? Probably wouldn’t be much fun. Or maybe it would be a lot of fun. Who knows? 

Really, I have nothing to complain about. I have a good life, but it’s been one of ‘those’ weeks. Wait…I mean months. I’m ready to go. Where is Paradise? I don’t know. But I have two tickets. Would you like to join me? 

I'm gonna take you on a trip so far from here, 

I've got two tickets in my pocket, now baby, we're gonna disappear. 

We've waited so long, waited so long.  

I made a Citron a while back. Probably a long while back since I tend to make and not block things. It was small and I was a little disappointed but I dug it out and decided to block it to see if I could make it bigger. I wet it and pinned it out and decided I’m a sloppy blocker. It stretched but the Citron is supposed to have these little puckers and I stretched some of the puckers. It’s still not big but it’s okay. It looks fine folded up like a scarf, too.

In progress

Back of Citron

Kind of cute as a scarf!

I am in awe of the people who stretch things out meticulously. I don’t have the patience. Actually I think I don’t have the knowledge. That would involve measuring and math, both of which I’m not fond. But it’s done now, even with the ends worked in!

Half-a** blocking. And it's not red, more maroon and pink and brown!

I’m ready for it to be fall. I like the colors and I found a little felted bag I made out of some yarn from our trip to Vermont a couple of years ago. It will be perfect for keys, I.D. and such when you just need a couple of things. It will fit inside a bigger bag then I’ll have what I need but I won’t have to carry all of it everywhere.

Felted bag. Fall colored yarn!

And finally, I’m almost through with the Halloween blankie for the littles. It’s not big either but it will be fun. I made some giant hairy spiders out of old chenille yarn I had hanging around. They have a buttonhole so they can be buttoned on to things. I had some odd orange buttons so I sewed them to the blanket and buttoned the spiders on. That way they can take those off if they want and play with them! I still need to make two or three more spiders and it will be done.

Hairy spider! Tarantula or Black Widow?

Halloween blankie for the Littles!

I think I’ll go pack. Some clothes, some yarn and I’m set!
 

Got a surprise especially for you, 

Something that both of us have always wanted to do. 

We've waited so long, waited so long. 

Won't you pack your bags, we'll leave tonight, 

I've got two tickets to paradise…

Hummingbird Don't Fly Away

Hummingbird don't fly away, fly away. Hummingbird don't fly away, fly away.

The sweetness of your nectar has drawn me like a fly.

I just love you, love you, love you. I don't even know the reason why.

I like hummingbirds. It’s a treat when we are at the mountain house to get to see them cluster around the feeder. The feeder hadn’t been up long, so there weren’t too many this time. Just three or four that battled the bees and wasps to get to the sugar water. But now they know it’s there, they will be back, and bring friends!

Imagine my surprise when I was on my deck at home the other day and something buzzed my head! I thought it was the biggest mosquito ever and I’d better take cover! I watched for a minute and there it was. A hummingbird! She, because she wasn’t bright and pretty, was getting nectar from the blooming trumpet vine. I couldn’t believe it! I ran to get the camera and you guessed it, she was gone. I didn’t even know we had them out here in the desert.

Female Hummingbird

The next morning I was ready. I waited outside because I was determined to get a picture. No such luck. This little bird was camera shy! As soon as I got ready away she flew! Darn.

That's where it was before the camera was ready.

I didn’t think much about it until the other day I when I went out around noon. BZZZZZZZ. There was another one! This one was a male, beautiful green and yellow colored. Don’t you think Mother Nature has it backwards? The female should be the pretty one! He buzzed some hanging things I had put up, he buzzed another colored string of turtles in the corner, and then he went to the trumpet vine. Soon he was joined by two more, both dull females, and I ran to get the camera. Alas, they sensed it and again, left as soon as I got the camera positioned.

There were three then there were none!

I do know why the females are dull colored. It’s to protect them while they nest. They blend in instead of sticking out and trying to take center stage. They usually only lay about two eggs and after they lay they become single bird parents and don’t need the mail around. Hey, maybe Mother Nature had it right after all! That male bird is gonna need something catchy to snag another friend!

I did manage to get some pictures of the birds at the feeder at the mountain house. Not good, mind you, but you can see a little black dot that IS a hummingbird! Maybe I need a better camera!

My friend Lydia has a cabin in East Texas. She’s recently posted a video of the hummingbirds at her feeder. You should check it out. It’s awesome! That is if you like hummingbirds!

Not Lydia's. It's what I wish a feeder here looked like!

Oh hummingbird, mankind was waiting for you to come flying along...

I’m having serious knock you out stress here so I have been trying to keep busy, so I’ve been crocheting and knitting. While sorting and trying to store some yarn I happened across the ugliest yarn ever, black and orange striped, which would be great if you were a Bengals fan, or lived in the rival town about twenty miles away. But I was neither and really am not sure why I got it. Anyway, I’m turning it into a small Halloween blanket for the Littles. It’s ugly, but hey, it’s Halloween!

A Halloween blankie in the making

I also blocked…yes, really, and actually finished a shawl. It’s little, and I’m not sure I like it although I really liked the yarn when I made it. But that’s the beauty of knit and crochet. If you don’t like it you just rip it out!

Pinned and blocking.

Up close pinned loops.

Back view of shawl.

Front. A little dark on the color.

I also started another of the magic granny square jackets, this on lighter and in a more subdued color. I think I am truly ADHD! Come to think of it though, the shawl colors remind me of hummingbirds.

Small enough to become a scarf!

Hummingbird don't fly away, fly away. Hummingbird don't fly away, fly away.

In you I've found a fragrance. I'll love you 'til I die.

I just love you, love you, love you. I don't even know the reason why.

Yes I'll Be Here When The Morning Comes...

I'll be right here, I ain't gonna run…
I just moved in my new house today.
Moving was hard but I got squared away.
When bells starting ringing and chains rattled loud,
I knew I'd moved in a haunted house.

Trick or treat! Remember those words? I remember waiting anxiously for the time we could go out and get candy. We’d dress up, nothing elaborate. It might just be face painting, funny clothes or a mask. Halloween. It was a day you got to pretend to be something or someone else. The elementary school a few blocks away, the one that my sister and brother and I all attended, all six years, would host a carnival each year. Back then we didn’t have to call it a fall festival, we called it what it was; a Halloween carnival. There were cakewalks, ball games, floating ducks, candy apples and prizes. It was a fun time for the whole family.

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Halloween to me was just another day except you had permission to ask anyone for candy. It had to be good if that was the case, right? But sometime from then to now the emphasis shifted. Instead of just a fun day it was considered evil and a pagan holiday. So the Halloween carnivals continued but we have to call them Fall Festivals now. There are cakewalks, ball games, floating ducks, candy apples and prizes. It’s still a fun time for the whole family. Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not knocking anyone for their opinion of Halloween. It really doesn’t matter to me what you call your Halloween or if you even acknowledge the holiday. It’s a personal preference and if I don’t like your choice I’ll change the channel, just as I’d want you to do should you disagree with my choice.

Lion Brand pattern.

Trick or treat in the small town I live in is different. At least when I first moved here years ago I thought it was different. It doesn’t matter when Halloween is. Trick or treat is the Saturday before. The fire siren rings at 4:30 and again at 6:00. When it rings the first time trick or treat has officially started. When it blows the second time it’s over. The ‘fall festival’ starts at 7:00 or so and at 10:00, when it ends, Halloween is over, even if it hasn’t come yet. After experiencing it for so long, I now think it’s not a bad idea at all. The kids are safe, it’s done and life goes on.

When you get too big to trick or treat or too old to dress up you don’t have much to do on Halloween. Since that’s the case, this Halloween we went out of town. Nobody has ever trick or treated at our house because we live in the country so no child was cheated out of a treat by us leaving town. We decided to spend Halloween Eve watching old horror movies. There were some classics, “The Fly”, the original from 1958, “Frankenstein's Daughter”, and “Return of the Fly”, as well as some that we’d never seen, “Strait- Jacket”, and “The Old Dark House”. Watching these movies now is funnier than it is scary. These aren’t the jump in your face Freddy movies, but just old, circa 1960’s, bizarre movies.

What I found entertaining, or weird, about two movies in particular, is that they both contained knitting. “The Old Dark House” and “Strait-Jacket” both had women knitting. “The Old Dark House” was kind of like clue. It had a very young Tom Posten in it. (He was the gardener on Newhart at the Vermont Inn). Anyway, the movie was one of those where there were a lot of eccentric people in an old, eerie, probably haunted house who were dying one by one and you had to figure out who the killer was. It reminded me of a version of “Clue”.

The mother in the show was named Agatha. Agatha always had her knitting with her. She said knitting is relaxing and knitting is her life. When asked what she was making and she said she just knits from the beginning to the end and it's bound to turn into something! She said she knit 150 miles last year and had a goal of 200 this year! She was never without her knitting. Of course, because this was a horror movie and everyone was murdered she was murdered as well. She was actually the first to go. They found her, knitting needles stuck through her neck, like a skull and crossbones, wrapped in her knitting and smiling. Morbid, yes, but because of her goofy expression we laughed.

The second movie with knitting was “Strait-Jacket”. Joan Crawford (creepy in her own rite), played a crazy lady, (Lucy), who chopped up her husband and his mistress, spent 20 years in an asylum and was reformed and released. She was out to live her life, but there was a crazy in the midst. Copycat axe murders were occurring and Lucy was the prime suspect. In one scene, where she was particularly frazzled, she held up her knitting. She said it was relaxing and she liked knitting. She said, “Remember, they taught me that in therapy.”

Another interesting thing? Both movies had the same director, William Castle. I think I'll look to see what other weird movies he directed...and if they have knitting.

I hope your Halloween was fun. Ours was. We watched the movies, laughed, and I knitted. It was relaxing and productive. And it wasn’t nearly as fattening as candy!

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Still I made up my mind to stay.
Nothing was a-gonna drive me away.
When I seen something that give me the creeps…
Had one big eye and two big feet.

Knityear is going strong. I hate when I get behind, though, because of travel for work. But at least I catch up and keep on knitting I guess. Day 211, October 28, is my parent’s anniversary, 54 years. Wow that’s a long time! I’m driving back from Presidio, late, and don’t have signal so again, I’m the bad daughter and don’t call. Oh well. The work I did made me feel valuable anyway, to Presidio anyway. I think I helped them. They were great to work with, regardless. I had some silver and gold yarn. It reminded me of treasure, and value. On day 212, October 29, I had a day off…sort of. I didn’t have to go to work but I did have to get things ready to head to Ruidoso. But I was so ready to head that way it didn’t matter. We left early enough to get there around 7:30. That’s a first. I felt revived breathing the mountain air. Pine needles, wood smoke and fresh air. I picked a green bulky that reminded me of the trees. October 30, Halloween Eve I guess, was a relaxed day. My sister and her husband came up and we watched silly old movies, went to a crafts fair and just relaxed. It was a good day for day 213. I had some sock yarn, greens, browns and blue, that reminded me of the peacefulness of the mountains. It was a good yarn for that day. Day 214, October 31, I had to use orange and black yarn because it was Halloween. I was reluctant to come down the mountain and go back to reality. But I did.

I stood right there and I did the freeze.
It did the stroll right up to me.
Made a noise with its feet that sounded like a drum.
Said "You gonna be here when the morning comes?"

"Say yes, I'll be here when the morning comes.
I'll be right here, I ain't gonna run…”